Nonprofit helps those with disabilities socialize, work, belong.

Tameka Hughes, 28, is confined to a wheel chair with cerebral palsy but utilizing technology she communicates and produces the ARC Times newsletter, creates flyers for various clubs and is the official blogger of the ARC website. We see Tameka in one of the ARC classrooms, Tuesday, December 13, 2011.

Cerebral palsy took Tameka Hughes' ability to walk and talk, but not her mind or ability to hear.

She knows when she is being treated like a child. With a single finger of her right hand the 28-year-old will tap out a response on the pink keyboard of her communicator and in a crisp feminine English accent the computer will speak for her.

“Sometimes, when people first meet me, they assume that I don't understand what they're saying because they see my wheelchair and hear the way that I talk,” she wrote. “It was very nice to not have that happen at The Arc.”

The Arc of San Antonio is one of the local nonprofits profiled as part of the San Antonio Express-News' 17th annual Grace of Giving series, which runs through Christmas.

Hughes started attending The Arc in 2006 after she finished school. She and her mother were looking for a safe place where she could go to socialize while working and maintain her life skills.

For those with developmental disabilities there are very few options after they turn 22 and can no longer attend public school, explained Steve Enders, CEO and president of The Arc.

“The local schools do a great job, he said. “But when the school bus stops coming, they tend to regress a bit.”

What The Arc provides is a place for those with disabilities to go while their families work, or for them to get out of the group homes they live in.

More than just a place to socialize, Enders said many of the adults of the program, like Hughes, are eager for meaningful work. In 2008 Hughes picked up the duties of writing, editing and designing the monthly in-house newsletter.

The three-page color printout summaries cover events like the fashion show put on by one of the clubs to making holiday cards, and volunteers going to sort food for the San Antonio Food Bank. There is a profile of a staff member and birthday announcements as well.

This year Hughes took over the biweekly blog at The Arc's website.

“I get to help some of The Arc participants who may not be able to tell their parents/guardians what they do while they attend The Arc,” Hughes wrote. “That gives me a very good feeling.”

What Hughes would love to do is be able to go out on more of the field trips to do her reporting. But despite having 350 participants split between two locations, The Arc has only one van that can accommodate wheelchairs. Hughes usually has to stay behind.

Nonetheless, with a purple feather boa across the front of her purple electric wheelchair, Hughes does her rounds, checking in on the decorations put up by each class, and saying hello to staff.

Her smile is obvious.

“It's important to me because it gives me a place in the community where I feel like I belong,” she said of The Arc. “That's important to anyone who has a disability.”